


the silence inbetween

by domesticadventures



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Copious Amounts Of Swearing, Gen, Headspace
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-20
Updated: 2015-01-20
Packaged: 2018-03-08 08:35:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,810
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3202697
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/domesticadventures/pseuds/domesticadventures
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>you say, <em>i can’t be that thing again</em>. there’s no third party here to let you pretend you’re saying it for any reason other than that it’s true.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the silence inbetween

**Author's Note:**

> title from florence and the machine's "no light, no light".
> 
> _you are the silence inbetween_   
> _what i thought and what i said_

the drive home starts out quiet, but you can feel it, that tension before sam is about to ask you to explain yourself. and you know you went too far with the shifter, okay? you went too far to such an extent that it’s easier to just refer to her like that, even to yourself, just _the shifter,_ even though you know her name. it would be easier if you didn’t, just like it would be easier if you hadn’t stepped into that attic and thought _this place looks like the inside of my head feels,_ all those relics of childhood that used to be touched every now and then with reverent fingers but are now just sitting collecting dust. but you do, and you did, and you know you went too far and there’s no excuse. why even bother telling sam about it. what could he tell you that you haven’t already tried to tell yourself.

he asks, though, just like you thought he would, and you say _target practice_ and when he doesn’t buy that you say _wanted to make sure it was done right._ just wanted to be sure, what a load of crap. you emptied an entire clip into her, for god’s sake. you’ve been using silver bullets how long? fifteen years? twenty? long enough to know she would have been screaming in agony with one of those in her chest, at any rate. she wouldn’t have just crumpled like she did. you know there’s no fucking excuse. you turn on the radio. it doesn’t go up loud enough to drown out your thoughts. not as if you expected it to.

you can’t stop yourself from thinking, there we go, just another not-quite-monster added to the kill list. so that’s it, a big string of corpses, that’s your legacy, that’s the evidence of your existence. your life is one big missing persons report. wow. congratulations.

\--

the danger, you think, in making self-deprecating jokes is that if the listener knows you well enough, there’s always the chance they’ll read them as the uncomfortable confessions they really are. what it really boils down to is sam knows you too fucking well for your own damn good. but oh, you’re good, you adapt, you flip the whole thing on its head and he hasn’t quite caught up yet, and maybe he doesn’t know you so well, after all.

_the people who love me, they pulled me back from that edge,_ that’s what you’d said, and it read like an uncomfortable confession, like something you really believed finally coming to the surface, but haha, it’s really just a joke, get it?

hilarious.

\--

_for the first time i've been back, i didn't feel like the mark was pushing me._

oh, man. you’re getting really fucking good at this. you almost had yourself believing it, that time.

\--

you roll into town because cas calls and when you show up and he gives his customary _hello, dean_ you quirk an eyebrow and you say, _where’s your female, did you forget her in the car again?_ he frowns at that and then he tells you what happened to her--what happened to hannah, of course it was her, you knew that, you’re not an idiot, you can recognize when people are trying to soft handle you, i mean really, _i have a female in the car,_ who was he fucking fooling--and you feel weird glee at that, you’re pleased in a way you don’t understand. i mean, you know she hated you. that’s nothing new, angels hating you. you suppose cas will end up hating you, too, sooner or later. it’s nice that he’s called you, really, you know, to give you another opportunity to jump start the process. how kind. but really, it’s nice that he called you. not that you’re going to tell him that. you say, _ah._ like that’s all the story warrants: _ah._ jesus.

cas doesn’t seem to think twice about it, though, he moves right on to what he knows will make you really uncomfortable, he asks, _how are you doing?_ you say, _still above ground._ what the fuck. why would you say that. why that, to the guy who pulled you from hell. and anyway, it’s not even funny, because you’ve been below ground and it wasn’t even always the worst option. you even ended up in heaven a couple of times, and i mean, you were alone, but it was good. that meant you didn’t manage to drag anyone down with you, so yeah, it was good.

but that’s beside the point, which is: what a fucking stupid thing to say. cas does that to you, though, has always done that, always throws you off balance, shifts you away from center. not that he seems to notice, or to mind, which, frankly, is a fucking mystery. your entire life is a series of sherlock novels and you can’t figure cas out. he’s not elementary, that one, he’s a goddamn doctoral program, he’s an always-on-call job at NASA. five years now and you still haven’t gotten the hang of him.

cas frowns. he’s onto you. fuck.

he’s staring at you in that way he has, looking at you like not only can he see your dusty parts, but like he’s rooting around in there, examining the stains in the carpet, too, and asking _hey, is that blood?_ , like he’s looking at the paint peeling, poking at the frame like _maybe it’s termites, or wood rot, or maybe the whole thing is about to come crashing down_ , toeing at cracks in the foundation to see if they’re cosmetic or structural. that look is like a goddamn home appraisal. no one has ever looked at you like cas does and you’re pretty sure both of you know it. fuck him and those exploratory stares.

_take a picture, it’ll last longer,_ you say, and he frowns deeper, not amused, just like he’s never been amused by your bullshit quips.

it’s like every time you want to ask him what it all means, you know, the profound bond, the _much of the time i would rather be here,_ the _never change,_ the _i did it, all of it, for you,_ what does it all add up to, does he want to weigh in on this, does he want to try and clarify because you sure as hell don’t. but instead you always say something like _last time someone looked at me like that i got laid,_ and he’s never fucking amused.

but sometimes it comes out as _i need you_ or some shit and that doesn’t make a difference, either, so. what does it all add up to? you’ve got an idea, on your end, but on his, you’ve got no fucking clue. you could ask him, yeah, and maybe he would tell you exactly what he means by it, or maybe he doesn’t have a clue, either, and you’re not sure which would be worse.

and really, what’s the best case scenario there? he tells you what you want to hear and means it, and it’s still not enough? your bullshit hasn’t scared him off entirely, yet, sure, but even if. even if--he doesn’t stick around, he never has. so what fucking difference would it make. you took that gamble before and it wasn’t enough then, so why would it be enough now. you’ll pass, thanks.

but you’re moving past it, now, because sam is doing that thing he does where he coughs to remind you both he’s still there, a six-foot-four-inch third wheel. cas is telling you what happened and you’re thinking, fuck. i fucking forgot about claire. because you did, you forgot about her just like sometimes you get so caught up in your own bullshit that you forget about cas. but you don’t wanna tell cas that now you feel even more like shit, so instead you tell him _some chick bolting on you is not an emergency._ like it fucking matters. cas is family. it shouldn’t have to be an emergency for him to take priority.

you’ve gotta get rid of sam asap, so you can start making some attempt at an apology. so you can start the damage control you can never manage when he’s around.

it’s a mistake, though, it’s a fucking mistake because as soon as you’re sitting, as soon as you’re in a position cas thinks maybe you can handle it now, he asks you _how are you, dean?_ again. except now you don’t have sam there as an excuse, and your _fine. i’m great._ convinces absolutely fucking no one.

but he’s looking at you again, he’s fucking looking at you like he actually believes that shit he implied about you being a role model, being some kind of ideal to live up to, and before you can tell yourself _what a load of crap,_ there’s this second where you feel like you’re finally getting it, the way things really are. it takes more than one person to lay a foundation. maybe all the cracks in yours aren’t your fault. but then you catch up to yourself and you realize, what good does that do you, though? what use is it to lay blame. those cracks are there to stay, those pieces are never going to be one cohesive whole ever again, not until time or trauma grinds them down into dust.

man, screw this self-awareness, you think. self-awareness fucking sucks.

you say, _i can’t be that thing again._ there’s no third party here to let you pretend you’re saying it for any reason other than that it’s true.

he won’t promise you, like you want. you suppose he doesn’t trust you to know what’s best for yourself. not that it matters. trust is something mutual, a give and take, and you haven’t truly given him yours in a long time. you’ve been thinking about revising that opinion, lately, but it doesn’t matter because the feeling isn’t mutual. it never is.

_we’ll figure something out,_ he says instead, to soften the blow, and if that isn’t your whole relationship in a nutshell, you don’t know what is. always trying to soften the blow.

\--

_tell me it was them or you,_ sam is shouting, but you barely hear him, you barely feel his hands on your shoulders, your face. you’re staring at nothing and nowhere but in your peripheral vision you can see cas, and he’s looking at you, and the weight of that look is all you can feel. you’ve seen him look at you a thousand ways, everything from anger and frustration and desperation to hope and kindness and love, but nothing like this, this complete and total fear at what you’ve become, of who you were all along.

_i’m past saving,_ you had said.

now, you really believe it.

 


End file.
